


Hungry

by JoAsakura



Series: Refuse/Refuge [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Back alley angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-08
Updated: 2016-09-08
Packaged: 2018-08-13 22:20:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7988167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoAsakura/pseuds/JoAsakura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some time before "We Could Be Heroes" Jack has only two things keeping him going- his mission and his memories.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hungry

**Author's Note:**

> I hadn't meant to write any more around the Grimdark Dumpster Sex fic, but, well, here we are.

His nerves are too raw for the shelter tonight, he thinks, the humidity so high that even breathing is a chore, let alone being around other people.

It's swelteringly hot and the night is a flickering mess of neon and sirens. Young thugs shoving an Omnic around at the corner, too young to even have the vaguest understanding of what the war did to both sides. He stands there, filthy tattered coat too heavy for the weather and just stares at them.

There's some primal fear that ticks off in their brains, this scar-faced old man with the shaggy beard, a predator's bright eyes sharp behind the thick, broken glasses. These kind of stare-downs, there's always a clear loser and it's never him.

The Omnic runs away too, and he just pushes the cardboard into his hiding place and sets down the battered duffel bag, looking up at the bruise-coloured clouds.

( _Small bites, make it last. Just like being behind enemy lines, not knowing when you can resupply._ ) He thinks, breaking off a piece of a half-eaten granola bar he'd snatched from the trash earlier, washes it down with what he thinks is vodka. ( _Gabriel ate too much, always hungry for something. Never knew that Jack cut into his own rations for him. No one did. Jack might have been the unit's heart, but Gabriel was their brains and he had to keep him ticking or they'd have been dead right out of the gate_.)

He thinks about Gabriel all the time, with a ferocity that frightens him. As if only two things that are real are his mission and his memories. It's easier to disassociate, to not think about the fact that since Geneva, he's wandered the world, hiding, raiding and dying off on the inside in fractional steps every moment.

_He watched his and Gabriel's funerals on a flickering TV in Barcelona, months after the boom, picking at some tapas and a warm beer. No one wanted to engage the shabby, bandaged man mumbling to himself in the corner. They were all crying, what was left of Overwatch._

_He wondered which ones were lying, as he nursed that beer. Wondered which ones had sold them out and left them to die in the flames. Which one he was going to have to put a bullet in. Which ones he had failed so badly that the felt they'd had to burn it all._

Overhead in the here and now, lightning dances with the heat from cloud to cloud, teasing but never delivering on the promise of rain, and he scratches the base of his skull. The tattoo is hidden under his hair there, SEPs faded tag. SEP_TS76.

More disassociation: it's easier to be TS76 these days. Being Jack-fucking-Morrison hurts so much as to be counter-productive to the mission.

More memory: _Gabriel's mouth on his, both of them starving for something more._ They had sex to mask the horrors of the war with the smell of each other's sweat. It wasn't uncommon- the whole team found comfort where they could sometimes. By the time what Gabriel sarcastically referred to as "Overwatch: The Motion Picture" was formed, habit had become relationship and they suddenly realised they didn't know how to actually talk to each other. And then habit became relationship became addiction.

And addiction became something else entirely. Bitter and burning and beautiful all at once.

They never quite learned how to talk without their bodies getting in the way until it was too late.

But it's Gabriel's face, his mouth, his hands that he sees when he touches himself, calloused hands stroking his shaft under the tattered clothing. They both had other lovers, before and after, but when Jack arches back against the duffel bag, feet scrabbling against the greasy pavement as he comes, it's only Gabriel he's coming for. 

He can feel the pulse rifle's barrel jabbing into the small of his back as he sags against the bag. Two hundred pound lump of stolen guns and ammo and armour, and he dissolves into a fit of laughter.

It's almost like having him back.

"Fuck you, you stupid son of a bitch." Jack says to it as he lies back, stomach growling like the impotent thunder overhead. "I miss you. Hope you're fucking raising hell wherever you are."

And under the layers of clothing, an alarm beeps and Jack sighs, cleaning himself up. Out comes the jacket, the visor, the heavy gun. The security detail on the nearby warehouse, loaded with old gear from the former Watchpoint, will be switching out soon, and he needs to be in position.

Jack Morrison slides on the visor, but it's TS76 who ratchets the pulse rifle, loading the ammo core into the breach. His stomach growls. He's always hungry these days too, but he can't put his finger on the need. 

"Time to go to work."


End file.
